Purchased in 1922 by Stephen & Katherine Gordeuk the 145 acres known as the Gordeuk Family Farm. The immigration story is a remarkable one, worthy of its own book that I hope one of our many guests might feel inspired to write.
Stephen came to America from a small village in present day Belarus, then Russia in 1903. The decision to immigrate to the United States was born of a broken heart, a bruised ego and a stubborn determination to make something of himself and return home to buy a farm. Katherine Gordeuk came to the United States from a small village in Belarus in 1909 after corresponding with her future husband via letters. At the age of 16 Katherine left her family and small village and stepped onto a boat bound for America and a proposal for a very different life than anything she knew.
Married in 1913 they lived in Youngstown, Ohio where Pop Gordeuk worked in tool manufacturing plants while Mom Gordeuk ran a boarding house for Russian workers at the various mills. They worked hard and started their family with the cherished goal of saving every cent to return to Belarus and buy a farm. Three years are spent working and saving towards the goal and finally they began the voyage home with their young son. Upon arrival in New York City Pop learned the terrible truth that the “agent” that he had been working with to secure passage tickets and purchase a farm was a scam. The whole of their life savings had been stolen from them, the last $10 pick pocketed as a dejected Stephen Gordeuk made his way back across the Brooklyn Bridge to the boarding house where his wife and son waited to begin the journey home.
The stubborn determination that brought him to this country in the first place was matched by his wife’s grit and together they survived the setback. Pop took a job as a farm hand in Frenchtown and after more years of hard work and saving the opportunity to purchase our family farm came about in 1922. The mortgage was granted for $3000 and another $1000 was borrowed and repaid from a shoemaker in Frenchtown. The family settled and raised 11 sons on the farm weathering another world war, the great depression and profound societal changes in industrialization, technology and education.
In their later years they moved to an adjacent farm where they lived out their days cared for by three of their sons and other family.
Matthew Gordeuk was number nine in the birth order of his brothers and destined to take the farm into the future. Matt & Anna Mary (Laire) Gordeuk purchased the farm from Pop & Mom in 1960, raising three children and expanding the farm into the recognized standard for dairy and crop production in the state. Under Matt & Anna Mary’s ownership the farm expanded to include a 125 head dairy operation, 750+ acres of neighboring farms and implemented many progressive regenerative agriculture practices such as the adoption of no-till planting in the 1980’s.
Their greatest contribution is the creation of the NJ Farmland Preservation Bill as we know it today. Matt’s deep passion and commitment to farming and preserving generational farmland in NJ was the driving force and culminated in the signing of the New Jersey Farmland Preservation Act on our farm in 1983 by Governor Tom Kean Sr. When we see the beautiful Preserved Farmland markers all over the state they are part of Dad’s legacy, a tribute to a lasting contribution made by a good man who believed deeply in the importance of protecting the future of farming and farmland in New Jersey.
Dad not only secured the possibility of thousands of acres of farmland being preserved, he created the foundation for the future generational farming we continue to pursue today.